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Fwd: Nabokov & a color question
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Please forgive this question re Homer. Where else should I have asked?
Jansy wrote: ". . . The homeric "purpureum" might not necessarily refer to
a "wine-red sea" but to the absence of a word for blue. . ."
Was there no word for blue when Homer wrote? I have heard that blue is the
last color to be named in every language, but have heard no definite reason
why this is so. What about Athena's glaucous eyes, which Andrew Lang
translated as gray eyes and which somebody interpreted, in a program about
Ulysses, as eyes of the most brilliant blue that television could produce?
Was the sea wine-red because there was no word for blue? (I've not seen the
Mediterranean, but I've seen red wine and it's hard to imagine any sea that
color or any shade of "wine-dark". Maybe unfermented juice of purple or
black grapes? Or maybe on rare occasions, as during an unusual sunset? Or
maybe I don't party often enough.)
Mary Krimmel
----- End forwarded message -----
Jansy wrote: ". . . The homeric "purpureum" might not necessarily refer to
a "wine-red sea" but to the absence of a word for blue. . ."
Was there no word for blue when Homer wrote? I have heard that blue is the
last color to be named in every language, but have heard no definite reason
why this is so. What about Athena's glaucous eyes, which Andrew Lang
translated as gray eyes and which somebody interpreted, in a program about
Ulysses, as eyes of the most brilliant blue that television could produce?
Was the sea wine-red because there was no word for blue? (I've not seen the
Mediterranean, but I've seen red wine and it's hard to imagine any sea that
color or any shade of "wine-dark". Maybe unfermented juice of purple or
black grapes? Or maybe on rare occasions, as during an unusual sunset? Or
maybe I don't party often enough.)
Mary Krimmel
----- End forwarded message -----